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MAY 11�18, 2022
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‘Marrying the Ketchups’ by Jennifer Close
A novel about lessons in life, love
and business centered around one
family’s suburban Chicago restaurant
By Cory Oldweiler
Star Tribune
O
ne of the worst parts of
waiting tables comes at
the end of the shift. You’re tired,
you’re hungry, but you still have
side work to do, like making
all the pawed-over, schmutz-
smeared ketchup bottles into
facsimiles of their once brand-
new selves. This process often
starts with pouring the vestiges
of one bottle into another, which
is a deceptively frustrating and
potentially very messy task
because, quite frankly, ketchup
doesn’t want to be poured.
Jennifer Close’s lovingly
lived-in novel “Marrying the
Ketchups” takes its title from this
dreaded duty, which it cleverly
enlists as metaphor for the ef-
forts of three cousins — Teddy,
Gretchen and Jane — trying
to scavenge and repackage
the pieces of their lives in the
wake of the 2016 election. Their
existential despair comes on
the heels of their grandfather’s
death in late October, just a week
before his beloved Cubs won
their fi rst World Series in 108
years. As Gretchen observes,
“Three impossible events, one
right after the other. Nothing
made sense anymore.”
In attempting to make sense of
the senseless, the 30-somethings
each seek the friendly confi nes
of Sullivan’s, their family’s restau-
rant in Oak Park, west of Chicago,
which had been a neighborhood
staple since their grandfather
opened it in 1979. Close know-
ingly expounds every insider-y
nuance of the restaurant busi-
ness as vividly as she recaptures
the rage and frustration that many
Americans felt in early 2017.
Teddy’s journey seems
easiest, trading his job running
a trendy West Loop eatery for
his dreams of revitalizing the
unintentionally retro Sullivan’s.
But his determination is frus-
Knopf
trated — both professionally, by
employees like his uncle who
resist change, and personally, by
his 16-year-old half-sister who
moves in with him.
Gretchen had remained in
New York City after college, stuck
leading a ‘90s cover band whose
glory days selling out East Coast
shows had given way to learn-
ing “Macarena” for Long Island
weddings. When her drummer
boyfriend confesses to cheating
on her with their guitarist, she
breaks free and moves back into
the apartment above Sullivan’s
where she grew up.
Her older sister, Jane, married
with two kids in the affl uent North
Shore, seemingly has it all fi gured
out. But even she is restless,
tired of bunko with judgmental
housewives and increasingly
lavish birthday parties hosted by
neighborhood children. As her
fears of complacency and di-
vorce materialize, she too heads
to the comfort of Sullivan’s.
These three, and indeed
all their friends and family, are
intensely recognizable charac-
ters, funny and fl awed, angry and
desperate, and much of the novel
is dedicated to their engaging
development — or lack thereof.
The story accelerates in the fi nal
section owing partly to an all-too-
real scandal surrounding consent,
harassment and the internet, par-
ticularly acute issues in the sleazy
klieg lights of the 45th president.
The conclusion is too neat,
perhaps, but the characters
acknowledge the privileges that
made it possible. And they also
realize that just because there
are things that can be saved, it’s
often better to throw it all out and
start from scratch.
Specializing in
HOMETOWN
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Keisha Anderson
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541.910.8827
www.johnjhoward.com
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